I am writing a superhero/supervillain novel series.

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I have recently been working on a novel series for a group of characters which are in what I have been calling "The Wonderverse." For now since I lack a comic illustrator I have decided to make each story I write "issues", introducing a villain and a hero in each issue. For now I am working on this story. I would like to know what you guys think about the story, and it would be helpful if I could acquire feedback and positive criticism?

Wonderverse issue #1. “The Copper Contraption Conspiracy.”

Young Felicity Saschas, (AKA Yellowtail) was making her rounds patrolling the rooftops of South Eastsalt City one foggy night in March. It has been raining earlier during the morning that day and she didn’t want to get wet, besides, patrolling from the rooftops gave her exercise and a good observation point to monitor the streets below her.

She tried not to yawn too much, but the night was foggy and dreary. Over the last several days crime has been relatively low, except for petty robbery. Mostly an old ladies purse or shoplifting, nothing Yellowtail couldn’t handle. She was actually quite relaxed this night and was more concerned with falling asleep on one of the rooftops rather then there being an actual emergency.

“AhhhhhhhhhWhhhhwh. Yet another normal boring night. Well let me make my last sweep before I call it a night, it is way past many evil doer’s bedtimes anyway. “Yellowtail said while yawing.

She sprinted, each successive footstep making a distinct sound. Scanning her surroundings in every direction, something odd caused her to stop to a screeching halt. Yellowtail looked over at a business office in her vicinity where this source took place.

It appeared that there was a group of what appeared to be thugs, but the strange part is their armaments were not like anything Yellowtail has seen before. Normally they would be armed with the mundane and generic weapon that they got their hands on black market. This time however they seemed to be wielding a very odd assortment of strange glowing weaponry that liked high tech, and at the same time very low tech and oddly enough 19th century.

“Heh, are these guys so broke they cannot afford pistols?” Yellowtail contemplated to herself trying not to laugh as she observed from a safe distance.

The thugs put a strange device down near the doorway of the office, it looked like some type of modified pressure cooker. They moved into the alleyway and it went off like a bomb, blowing up the door and unleashing a blue blast. Yellowtail covered her eyes and saw them move inside. She then heard the alarm go off, but then for some reason it stopped.

“Guess a girl’s job is never done.” She said as she jumped from the building and landed athletically on the ground.

The robbers have already entered the building by the time Yellowtail arrived on the scene. A thug was guarding the exit while the others looted the office. Yellowtail was able to sneak to the side and knockout the guard from the side, then she stepped through the destroyed door.

“Alright you knuckleheads, you picked the wrong night to go on a shopping spree.” Yellowtail exclaimed to the thugs.

“Who is the heck is this bimbo?” Asked one of the thugs.

“The heck if I know, just get her!” Exclaimed the other thug ordering the first one to charge at her.

The thug charged at Yellowtail. When he got close he tried grabbing her, yet she merely took hold of his wrist and flung him down unto the ground. The other thugs were in shock to see a teenage girl in a costume able to toss their partner in crime on the ground so swiftly. The thug tried to get up, but she kicked him hard in the stomach.

“Yeah, like I am just going to let you get back up.” She remarked.

“Ah, just unload on her!” Another thug said while taking his strange pistol and firing at her.

Yellowtail ran to the side trying to stay out of the line of fire. While the thug’s strange weapons were seemingly primitive, they were nonetheless deadly. Yet Yellowtail posed abnormally swift agility and speed. These abilities, combined with the thugs armtuer shooting ability allowed Yellowtail to negate the barrage and move in close proximity to the thug. She then moved in and grabbed his weapon.

“Nice toy you got here, too bad I have to break it.” She said before tearing the weapon apart.

The thug gasped at the fact she was able to tear his weapon in half so easily. Yellowtail dropped the broken weapon’s pieces and uppercuttted the soldiers chin knocking him down.

“Well that takes care of-“

Yellowtail was then zapped from behind by what was a sort of steampowered tesla gun. She screamed and feel to her knees, it was a low voltage so she was still conscious.

“Nuts to this, let’s get out of here!” Exclaimed one thug as him and the rest ran out to escape.

Yellowtail was able to stand herself back up again, while she was fine she hadn’t felt a zap like that in a long time. She then realized she obviously underestimated the thugs and the strange weaponry they possessed.

“Ugh..I am going to feel that one in the morning.” Yellowtail said as she walked out and went back into an alleyway to change her costume. She then went back to her apartment and went to bed.

The next morning Felicity got up and made herself some breakfast. While she ate she turned on her laptop and used it to contact a friend of hers. He was sort of her geeky database. If anyone could help her gather information and clues it would be him.

“Rough night last night Felictiy?” Her friend said via internet voice chat.

“You could say that, I tried to stop a caper and got a jolt out of it.” Felictity said trying to be puny.

“You always like fighting bad guys, preferably beating them up in the face.” Said her friend.

“No, I mean I was literally zapped by some odd electric gun thing.” Felictiy responded.

“Like a Taser?” Asked Felicity’s friend.

“No, bigger than a Taser, it was like some strange glowing gun that had a round ball like end and several rings on it.Like one of those things you find on mad scientist laborites.” Felicity replied trying to make sense of what she saw.

“Ah, you mean a Tesla Coil? “ Her friend said showing her a picture of one via the internet.

“Yes! This thing.” Felicity said

“Hm, strange. Felictity, can you tell me any more about the robbery?” Her friend asked.

“Well GB, it was at a office with a whole bunch of computers and business equipment.” Felictiy explained.

“And what was stolen?” Asked her friend.

“Ugh, I didn’t waste too much time on figuring that out, all I saw was a couple of guys wrecking on some computers.” Felictity replied.

“I see, can you describe the weapons the thugs use for me please?” Asked her friend.

“Well GB, they were strange. Unlike normal guns and stuff. They looked old, like not ran on electricity old, defiantly retro. They blew up the door of the office with some sort of strange pressure cooker looking explosive.” Felictiy told him nervous of sounding delusional.

“Interesting, hold on while I look into it.” Her friend said while he typed on his keyboard.
Felicity waited while her friend searched.

“It appears this has happened before multiple times. Over the course of several months there has been sightings of activity all over Eastsalt where strange groups of armed thugs wielding what appears to be steam based technology. There have also been reports of vandalism around these areas.” He reported.

“Hey, I can’t be everywhere at once you know.” Felictiy replied trying to defend herself.

“Well then perhaps it is time to go to the source?” Her friend asked.

“Yes, but where do I start? I don’t have any leads.”
(What I have for now.)

I am having trouble thinking how the villain should appear, what I can tell you so far is his villain name is "Steam Punk", and he is a genius teenage aspie who is obsessed with steam based technology after he visited a train museum child. He has animosity towards his parents as both of them are adepts in the field of modern technology, and they tried pushing current technology down his windpipe.(Figuratively of course.) Think of him as the Toy Man, or Dr.Eggman, only with steampunk based weaponry and robots.

Here are some ideas I had.

1) She could have a previous encounter with a lieutenant of Steam Punk before. Knowing this lieutenant was loyal to someone else like say a gang or mob boss or someone else, she now has an organization to go to and figure out why the lieutenant switched loyalty to Steam Punk. This then leads to finding out certain events and information that give her an idea of where Steam Punk operates from and who Steam Punk is known to deal with.

2) After a few more vandalism and thefts, a pattern does emerge, but not to Yellowtail or the police. This person the pattern appears to ends up coming to Yellowtail after being rejected by the police. This pattern now known to Yellowtail allows her to piece together Steam Punk's goal and lay a trap or be ready for the next strike.

3) Yellowtail and other heroes end up thwarting enough robberies and vandalism by steam punks minions that it forces steam punk to come out in the open. and directly apply himself to the situation.

4) Plant a tracking bug on a few of Steam Punk's minions. Track them back to their rendevous with friendly forces which Steam Punk may or may not be at to receive the goods stolen.

5) Yellowtail continually roughs up Steam Punk's forces that it forces in such a way that from Steam Punks point of view she's declared war on him and his faction. Then they have a showdown to settle things.

hmm the “Heh, are these guys so broke they cannot afford pistols?” part doesn't sound convincing. TBH, Yellowtail seems to be talking in nothing but cliches. I'd advise you to put some work into making her voice more authentic and creating more of a personality for her. all of the greatest superhero characters had very distinct personalities. maybe if you work on her background and psyche a bit more, the best plotline for her will become clearer to you?

anyway, good luck with the story!

I was afraid this would happen, actually Yellowtail isn't my character. She is a friend of mine who is working on illustrating my other characters. The deal was I put his character in my series and we work on this together. That is her character, to be one of those types of superheros who is very cliche,(from what I've heard she is based off of Supergirl and Batgirl.) Eventually I will get to my villain, and he I made sure of having personality. (Villains are my strong point in writing, and I have an entire cast of my own original characters. Yet for now I must repay my debt to my friend while working on the story. I am working on part 2 for now so once my villain is in perhaps the story can get more light?

I will cheer for your villain then

Said? She talks to herself?


I've known cars and trains come to a screeching halt, but never a pedestrian. How about a sudden halt?


Perhaps "from where the sound came"?


Suggested changes in italics.


Redundant. If you jump from a rooftop and want to walk away, then you need to have good coordination and good muscles (unless it's a very low building). You don't need to say she is athletic.


Suggested change in italics.


She avoided being shot through abnormal agility and speed, yet now she stops for witty repartee? She deserves to get zapped. Give her a Darwin award.


You don't need to say that this is what made the thug gasp, unless tearing firearms apart with your bare hands is so common in this world that the thug's surprise is itself surprising.


This is all told from Yellowtail's point of view, she is being zapped from behind. How does she notice she is being zapped by a steam-powered Tesla gun?


A moment ago, these guys were trying to kill her. Now they put her out of action, but instead of a) finishing her off quickly b) working off their adrenaline by putting the boot in or c) getting on with the business of robbing the shop, they d) just run away? That suggests panic. Are they inexperienced? If you later say that the thugs are experienced, this scene will not make sense, unless you give a reason for the sudden urgency. Can't be the sound of the gunshots. The explosion that took out the door must have been louder. Perhaps one of them could say "No more time! Go, go, go!" Or else let one of the thugs take aim, and another says "She hasn't seen our faces, and we want the cops to be bored by a burglary, not motivated by a murder!"


Still the same character's point of view? Does she think of herself by different names, depending on context? Or is there another reason to switch from Yellowtail to Felicity?


So that suggests she didn't know what zapped her when it happened. If you tell the story from one character's point of view, you can only tell what that character knows when she or he knows it.

Broader perspective: Like anna-banana said, the character is a bit generic, but if that's what you're going for, OK.

There was a bit about the the thugs being surprised at the fighting ability of a costumed teenage girl. Does that mean superheroes are something so new that the news hasn't gotten around to criminals? Or are there so many imitators that they are surprised to meet the real thing?

Lotta taglines...The same ones several times in a row, too..